It certainly was a “December to Remember” for Portsmouth Rotary. We had a great turnout at the Christmas Party on Tuesday the 5th, and our meeting turnouts the past couple months have been outstanding. Karen Davis did an excellent job planning the party and decorating. Linda Woods-Jones helped coordinate the RSVP’s and run the party.

Tess Midkiff, Stan Jennings, Dave Stone, Brad Bergeford, and Mark Hunter met with the County Commissioners to discuss a potential project for the “Old River Road” which would connect Alexandria Point to the Canal lock near Earl Thomas Conley Park. Like many large projects in our area, there will be a lot to discuss in the planning/strategy of this project, and it will take years. Portsmouth Rotary is truly the organization that will connect the necessary decision-makers to help this project’s potential.

We held our annual elections for our board, and are pleased to welcome Mike Williams, Ralph Wisniewski, and Dan Simco. Furthermore, I am grateful for Jay Willis and Linda Woods-Jones’ continued presence on our board. They have both served our club with great enthusiasm, and I’m excited to see them back. I’m also proud to announce that I will be serving as President for the 2018-2019 year. It’s been an amazing experience thus far, and it has gotten easier every day. The first few months, I certainly tried to do too much, but now and moving forward I just want to focus on promoting the work and accomplishments of our members.

Lydia Sims and her team are looking to Chair our International projects and Youth Exchange Program. She and I have helped Caden Wilcox from the Portsmouth Stem Academy become a Youth Exchange Student for the 2018-2019 school year. We are currently looking for potential host families for the 2018-2019 exchange year.

Jay Willis has done an outstanding job on our Literacy Project. This project, once a simple dictionary give-away from us has turned into a 4-organization collaboration with over $4,500 funding thus far. This year, the project will feature the book “Not a Drop to Drink.” The book describes a world with very little water, and how humans will struggle if our world ran short on fresh water. Students will be given a copy of the book, and get the opportunity to see the author speak later in the year.

This past Saturday the 16th, we had a great turnout to ring the bells for the Salvation Army. Thank you so much to everyone who came out to help with that day: Mary Arnzen, John Prose, Harold Massie, Scott Dutey, Lenzie Hedrick, John Walker, Dave Stone, John Haas, Derek Allen, Briana Brown, Dick Schisler, Tess Midkiff, Lydia Sims, and Chad Phipps.

Most importantly, I want everyone to know that we will move back to our regular schedule of meeting every Monday starting in February. Several amazing members have came forward to help fill the upcoming months with some great speakers. Specifically, Dick Schisler has offered to fill the meetings in February and Stan Jennings has offered to fill March. Are you interested in helping fill speakers in a particular month? Here are the simple steps 1.) Contact Lydia to find-out what month is available. 2.) Commit to an available month 3.) Find some speakers for those meetings 4.) Send the list to Lydia 2 months prior to your desired month. If you have trouble finding 4 speakers for a particular month, just simply ask one of your friends to help.

This movement toward our membership engaging speakers will help remove a tremendous burden from 1 person having to find and schedule speakers. Furthermore, this will promote collaboration within our club to drive membership engagement.

I could easily write a novel about all of the great people from our club, and their respective accomplishments this past year. The upcoming Holiday Break will be much-needed for many of us, and give us time to plan for the upcoming year. We will bring a lot of momentum into the next 2 years to celebrate our 100th! Be sure to start thinking about ways for us to celebrate the 100th because it will be here before we know it. Call-up a couple Rotarians, ask them to meet for coffee (or beer), put down some ideas for celebrations/fund-raisers, bring those ideas to our board meetings, and we will help you get them funded and staffed. Now is the best time to start planning.

I’m heading to Pinehurst on 12/27 through 1/4, and will be thinking about you all while I’m there. Thank you all so much for an amazing year of service, and I will see you next year.

50 years ago, the first Rotaract club was formed to give young adults a place to connect and take action for good. Rotaract members from each decade share what the program was like and how it shaped their